Seeing Through Statistics 4th Edition

Utts Test Bank

Visit to download the full and correct content document: https://testbankdeal.com/dow
nload/seeing-through-statistics-4th-edition-utts-test-bank/
CHAPTER 9

PLOTS, GRAPHS, AND PICTURES

SECTION 9.1

WELL-DESIGNED STATISTICAL PICTURES

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

1. What is the purpose of a plot, graph, or picture of data?
ANSWER: TO GIVE YOU A QUICK VISUAL SUMMARY OF THE DATA THAT IS
MORE INFORMATIVE THAN LOOKING AT A COLLECTION OF NUMBERS.

2. Name three basic characteristics that a good plot, graph, or picture of data should exhibit.
ANSWER: ANY 3 OF THE FOLLOWING: 1) DATA SHOULD STAND OUT CLEARLY;
2) LABELING SHOULD BE COMPREHENSIVE AND CLEAR; 3) A SOURCE SHOULD
BE GIVEN FOR THE DATA; AND 4) AS LITTLE “CHART JUNK” AS POSSIBLE.

For Question 3, use the following narrative

Narrative: Lottery dollar
Suppose you came across the following graph in the paper, accompanied by an article on where each
dollar spent on lottery tickets goes.

3. {Lottery dollar narrative} This graph has a problem, according to the four characteristics that any
good graph should have. What is the problem with this graph?
ANSWER: THERE IS NO SOURCE GIVEN FOR THE DATA.

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

4. Which of the following is not a characteristic of a good plot, graph, or picture of data?
a. A source must be given for the data.
 b. The picture should contain as much information, color, and extra material as possible to
keep readers interested.
c. The labels should be clear and informative.
d. All of the above are good characteristics of a good plot, graph, or picture of data.
ANSWER: B

5. Which of the following is not true about the plots, graphs, or pictures of data that you come across
in the media?
a. Most of these pictures can give you a clear, quick visual summary of that data.
b. One purpose is to convey a message more quickly than if you had to study the data on
your own.
c. Very few of the pictures are misleading because they are checked for accuracy and
fairness before being presented.
d. None of the above.
ANSWER: C

6. Which of the following should be indicated by the labels on a graph?

a. The title or purpose of the picture.
b. What each of the axes, bars, pie segments, etc., denotes.
c. The scale of each axis, including starting points.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: D

SECTION 9.2

PICTURES OF CATEGORICAL DATA

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

7. What is one advantage of a bar graph over a pie chart?
ANSWER: A BAR GRAPH IS MUCH MORE VERSATILE. IT CAN BE USED TO
REPRESENT ACTUAL FREQUENCIES INSTEAD OF PERCENTAGES, AND TO
REPRESENT PROPORTIONS THAT ARE NOT REQUIRED TO SUM TO 100%.

8. It is easy to be misled by pictograms. Explain how.

ANSWER: TO AVOID DISTORTING THE PICTURES, THE HEIGHTS ARE OFTEN
PUT IN PROPER PROPORTION, BUT THEN THE AREAS BECOME INFLATED,
MISLEADING THE READER.

9. What type of data situation is best for using a pie chart (discuss type of data and number of
variables)?
ANSWER: ONLY ONE CATEGORICAL VARIABLE.

10. The focus of each type of data picture for categorical data is conveying information about the
relative size of groups compared to each other. Explain what is meant by ‘relative size.’
ANSWER: THE PERCENTAGE OF THE WHOLE THAT FALLS INTO EACH GROUP
(COMPARED TO JUST THE NUMBER IN EACH GROUP).

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

11. Which of the following is not a type of picture for organizing categorical data?
a. A pie chart.
b. A bar graph.
c. A pictogram.
d. A histogram.
ANSWER: D

12. The following is an example of what type of data picture?

a. A pie chart.
b. A bar graph.
c. A pictogram.
d. A line graph.
ANSWER: A

13. The following is an example of what type of data picture?

a. A pie chart.
b. A bar graph.
c. A pictogram.
d. A line graph.
ANSWER: B
 14. Which of the following is not possible to include on a bar graph?
a. Frequency in each category for a categorical variable.
b. Information representing two or three categorical variables simultaneously.
c. Proportions that are not required to sum to 100%.
d. All of the above are possible with a bar graph.
ANSWER: D

FILL-IN-THE-BLANK QUESTIONS
15. A __________ can be used to represent two or three categorical variables simultaneously.
ANSWER: BAR GRAPH

16. A __________ is like a bar graph except that it uses pictures related to the topic of the graph.
ANSWER: PICTOGRAM

SECTION 9.3

PICTURES OF MEASUREMENT VARIABLES

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

17. Name three types of statistical pictures that are used to represent measurement data.
ANSWER: ANY 5 OF THE FOLLOWING ARE OK: 1) HISTOGRAM; 2) STEMPLOT; 3)
LINE GRAPH; 4) SCATTERPLOT; OR 5) BOXPLOT.

18. What does each dot on a scatterplot represent, in terms of both the individuals and their
measurements?
ANSWER: EACH DOT REPRESENTS ONE INDIVIDUAL, AND ITS
CORRESPONDING PAIR OF MEASUREMENTS (SUCH AS HEIGHT AND WEIGHT).

19. Although a scatterplot can be more difficult to read than a line graph, it displays more information.
Explain why.
ANSWER: A SCATTERPLOT SHOWS OUTLIERS, AS WELL AS THE DEGREE OF
VARIABILITY THAT EXISTS FOR ONE VARIABLE AT EACH LOCATION OF THE
OTHER VARIABLE.

20. Name a situation in which a scatterplot is most useful for displaying measurement data.
ANSWER: 1) FOR DISPLAYING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TWO
MEASUREMENT VARIABLES.

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

21. The following is an example of what type of data picture?

 a. A pie chart.
b. A scatterplot.
c. A pictogram.
d. A line graph.
ANSWER: D

22. The following is an example of what type of data picture?

(degrees Fahrenheit)

90
80
Temeprature

70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
0 15 30 45
# Cricket Chirps per 15 seconds

a. A line graph.
b. A scatterplot.
c. A Cartesian coordinate graph.
d. None of the above.
ANSWER: B

23. Measurement data displayed in terms of how they change over time can not be represented by
what type of statistical picture?
a. A line graph.
b. A bar graph.
c. A histogram.
d. All of the above can be used.
 ANSWER: C

24. What characteristics do statistical pictures of measurement data allow us to examine?

a. Trends or patterns in the data.
b. Variability in the data.
c. The overall shape of the data.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: D

FILL-IN-THE-BLANK QUESTIONS
25. A(n) __________ is useful for displaying the relationship between two measurement variables.
ANSWER: SCATTERPLOT

26. A(n) __________ is a good way to represent measurement data as it changes over time.
ANSWER: LINE GRAPH

SECTION 9.4

PICTURES OF TRENDS ACROSS TIME

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

27. Name one way in which a time series plot can be misleading.
ANSWER: ANY REASONABLE ANSWER OK; EXAMPLES: 1) TIME LINE TOO
SHORT TO GET A FULL PICTURE OF THE FLUCTUATION THAT COULD OCCUR;
2) STARTING THE DATA AT AN ADVANTAGEOUS POINT (FOR EXAMPLE, WHEN
THE STOCK PRICE STARTED GOING UP).

28. What two things should you check regarding the timeline of a time series in order to avoid being
misled?
ANSWER: 1) THE LENGTH OF THE TIMELINE; 2) THE STARTING POINT

29. Most time series contain the same four components Name two of them.
ANSWER: ANY TWO OF THE FOLLOWING: 1) LONG-TERM TREND; 2) SEASONAL
COMPONENTS; 3) IRREGULAR CYCLES; OR 4) RANDOM FLUCTUATIONS.

30. Why is it important for a manufacturer to know about any seasonal component to the time series
of the sales of their product?
ANSWER: IF THEY DON’T KNOW THIS INFORMATION, THEY MIGHT MISTAKE
INCREASED SALES AS A LONG TERM TREND AND OVERPRODUCE THEIR
PRODUCT, FOR EXAMPLE.

31. How can a time series plot mislead the reader into thinking that a trend in the data is long term,
when in fact it is only short term?
ANSWER: BY ONLY SHOWING A SMALL TIME PERIOD ON THE TIME SERIES
PLOT; THE PART THEY WANT YOU TO SEE.

32. Even if you were to account for the trend, seasonal components, and smooth irregular cycles, you
would still not be able to perfectly explain or predict a time series plot. Why not?
 ANSWER: RANDOM FLUCTUATIONS ARE PART OF THE NATURAL VARIABILITY
PRESENT IN ALL MEASUREMENTS.

33. Name two questions you should ask to avoid being misled when reading time series data.
ANSWER: ANY TWO OF THE FOLLOWING ARE OK: 1) ARE THE TIME PERIODS
EQUALLY SPACED? 2) IS THE SERIES ADJUSTED FOR INFLATION? 3) ARE THE
VALUES SEASONALLY ADJUSTED? 4) IS THE TIME LINE LONG ENOUGH? 5) IS
THERE AN UPWARD OR DOWNWARD TREND? 6) ARE THERE OTHER SEASONAL
COMPONENTS THAT HAVE NOT BEEN REMOVED? 7) ARE THERE SMOOTH
CYCLES?

34. Explain why it is not wise to forecast a trend very far into the future.
ANSWER: WHAT APPEARS AS A TREND IN A SHORTER TIME SERIES MAY
ACTUALLY BE PART OF A CYCLE IN A LONGER TIME SERIES.

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

35. Which of the following does not describe a time series?
a. A time series is a record of a variable across time.
b. A time series is usually measured at equally spaced time intervals.
c. A time series is a data set on numerous individuals measured in units of time (for
example, time until completion of the obstacle course; or time until graduation).
d. All of the above describe a time series.
ANSWER: C

36. How does a time series plot differ from a histogram?

a. A histogram displays one measurement variable, but a time series plot displays data with
two measurement variables (time is one of them).
b. A histogram displays data collected at one point in time, while a time series plot displays
data collected over a series of times.
c. If a histogram is flat, that indicates more variability than if it were bell-shaped. If a time
series plot is flat, that indicates less variability than if it were bell-shaped.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: D

37. Which of the following does not describe a time series plot with an irregular cycle?
a. It repeatedly goes up and back down smoothly, but with an irregular pattern so as not to
be predictable.
b. It randomly fluctuates with no pattern at all.
c. Its irregularity can often be explained by outside factors such as political or social
situations.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: B

38. Which of the following components of a time series plot is defined as what’s left over when the
other three components have been removed?
a. Random fluctuations
b. Seasonal components
c. Irregular cycles
d. Long-term trend
ANSWER: A

39. Which of the following describes the result of seasonally adjusting a time series (such as the
unemployment rate)?
a. The seasonal extremes have been removed.
 b. One time period no longer dominates each year as the high or the low.
c. The variability is reduced.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: D

40. Suppose the President is campaigning for reelection, and says you should vote for him because a
downward trend in the unemployment rate has occurred over the last four years. What can you
conclude?
e. This trend will likely continue for a long time whether the president is reelected or not.
f. This trend could just be a part of the longer-term, up and down behavior of
unemployment rates.
g. This trend was definitely caused by the President and his administration. He should be
reelected if you expect it to continue.
h. None of the above.
ANSWER: B

FILL-IN-THE-BLANK QUESTIONS
41. If a long-term trend in a time series plot is linear, we can estimate it by finding a regression line,
with time period as the __________ variable.
ANSWER: EXPLANATORY

42. Many time series measure variables that either increase or decrease steadily across time. This
steady change is called a(n) __________.
ANSWER: TREND

SECTION 9.5

DIFFICULTIES AND DISASTERS IN PLOTS, GRAPHS, AND

PICTURES

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

43. Name two of the five most common problems in plots, graphs and pictures.
ANSWER: ANY TWO OF THE FOLLOWING: 1) ONE OR MORE AXES NOT
LABELED; 2) NOT STARTING AT ZERO; 3) CHANGES IN LABELING ON ONE OR
MORE AXES; 4) MISLEADING UNITS OF MEASUREMENT; OR 5) USING POOR
INFORMATION.

44. What is wrong with the following histogram?

 State Populations (2000 Census)

35
F 30
R 25
E
20
Q
U 15
E 10
N 5
C 0
Y
Population Size

ANSWER: THE HORIZONTAL AXIS HAS NO UNITS LABELED.

For Questions 45-46 use the following narrative:
Narrative: Average hourly earnings
The graph below, done in 1998 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, represents the average hourly
earnings of U.S. workers from 1947-1998 (in 1998 dollars).

45. {Average hourly earnings narrative} The designers of this graph expressed all their data in terms
of 1998 dollars. Explain why they did this, and whether or not you think this is a good idea.
ANSWER: IT IS IMPORTANT TO USE FAIR AND COMPARABLE UNITS OF
MEASUREMENT, AND CONVERTING ALL WAGES TO 1998 DOLLARS DOES THAT.

46. {Average hourly earnings narrative} Describe the scale used on the vertical axis and whether or
not it is appropriate.
ANSWER: THE SCALE STARTS AT $6 AND GOES BY INCREMENTS OF $3 WITH
LOTS OF SPACE BETWEEN EACH ONE. THIS MAY EXAGGERATE THE
DIFFERENCES FROM YEAR TO YEAR.
 MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS
47. In what way(s) can a poorly done pie chart be misleading?
a. Changes in labeling on one or more axes.
b. Not starting at zero as a way to exaggerate trends.
c. Using poor information.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: C

48. In what way(s) can a poorly done histogram be misleading?

a. Changes in labeling on one or more axes.
b. Not starting at zero as a way to exaggerate trends.
c. Using poor information.
d. All of the above.
ANSWER: D

49. Suppose you have data on the number of accidents at a certain intersection for the following years:
1960, 1965, 1975, and 1990. What is the best way to display this information fairly?
a. A bar graph with one bar for each year of data available; the bars are an equal distance
apart.
b. A line graph with the years from 1960 through 1990 marked off in equal increments and
dots on the line graph representing the number of accidents for the years for which data
are available. The dots are connected with lines.
c. A pie chart with a slice for the percentage of accidents occurring in each of the four years
for which data is available.
d. Any of the above.
ANSWER: B

50. If the scale on the vertical axis is in very large increments with very little space between each one,
what does this do to the appearance of the data?
a. It makes differences appear smaller than they really are.
b. It makes differences appear larger than they really are.
c. It does nothing to affect the appearance of the data.
d. It makes the information easier to read and understand.
ANSWER: A

FILL-IN-THE-BLANK QUESTIONS
51. A statistical picture isn’t worth much if the __________ can’t be trusted.
ANSWER: DATA (OR SOURCE, INFORMATION)

52. Units of measurement are important. If a graph showed the number of crimes in each state for a
given year, this would be misleading; the __________ should be reported instead.
ANSWER: CRIME RATE; NUMBER OF CRIMES PER CAPITA; NUMBER OF
CRIMES PER 100,000 PEOPLE, ETC.

SECTION 9.6

A CHECKLIST FOR STATISTICAL PICTURES

FREE RESPONSE QUESTIONS

53. Name 3 of the 12 questions you should ask when you look at a statistical picture, before trying to
interpret it.
ANSWER: ANY 3 OF THE FOLLOWING ARE OK: 1) DOES THE MESSAGE STAND
OUT? 2) IS THE PURPOSE EVIDENT? 3) IS THE SOURCE GIVEN? 4) IS THE
SOURCE BELIEVABLE? 5) IS IT CLEARLY LABELED? 6) DO THE AXES START AT
ZERO? 7) FOR TIME SERIES DATA, IS A LONG ENOUGH TIME PERIOD SHOWN?
8) CAN OBSERVED TRENDS BE EXPLAINED BY ANOTHER VARIABLE? 9) DO THE
AXES KEEP A CONSISTENT SCALE? 10) ARE THERE ANY BREAKS IN THE
NUMBERS? 11) IS FINANCIAL DATA ADJUSTED FOR INFLATION? 12) IS THERE
“CHART JUNK”?

For Questions 54-55 use the following narrative

Narrative: Pick 3 lottery
The Kansas Pick 3 Lottery results through 3/15/97 are shown in the table below. In this game, three
numbers are drawn each week, and numbers can be repeated (such as 2, 3, 3).

Number drawn Number of times Percentage of

drawn times drawn
0 485 10.0%
1 468 9.7%
2 513 10.6%
3 491 10.1%
4 484 10.0%
5 480 9.9%
6 487 10.0%
7 482 10.0%
8 475 9.8%
9 474 9.8%

54. {Pick 3 lottery narrative} Using the number of times each number was drawn, display the data in a
bar graph that looks as though the number 1 was chosen much less often, and number 2 much
more often, than the other numbers. (This will be a misleading graph.) Explain why the lottery
chose to display their data in a similar way in their newsletter.

ANSWER: THE GRAPH SHOULD HAVE AN EXAGGERATED SCALE, SHOWING

THE HEIGHT OF THE BAR FOR NUMBER 1 BEING VERY LOW, AND THE HEIGHT
OF THE BAR FOR 2 BEING VERY HIGH, COMPARED TO THE OTHER BARS.
REASON: TO GIVE THE APPEARANCE THAT THERE IS SOMETHING
‘INTERESTING’ GOING ON; THAT YOU SHOULD PLAY, AND PICK 2 BECAUSE
IT’S ‘HOT’ OR PICK 1 BECAUSE IT’S ‘DUE TO COME UP.’ NEITHER OF THESE IS
TRUE.

55. {Pick 3 lottery narrative} Display the data in a bar graph that makes the point that each number is
drawn about the same percentage of the time.
ANSWER: THE GRAPH SHOULD HAVE AN APPROPRIATE SCALE, SHOWING THE
BARS FOR ALL NUMBERS TO BE ABOUT EQUAL IN HEIGHT. HEIGHTS
REPRESENT THE PERCENTAGE OF TIMES EACH NUMBER WAS DRAWN.

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

 56. Which of the following is not a characteristic of a good plot, graph, or picture of data?
a. Financial data collected over time should be adjusted for inflation.
b. Any breaks between years where data is missing should be closed in and not left as empty
spaces.
c. The labels should be clear and informative.
d. All of the above are good characteristics of a good plot, graph, or picture of data.
ANSWER: B

57. Which of the following is not true about a plot, graph, or picture of data?
a. Extraneous information should be excluded; the more extra information on a graph, the
more confusing it can get.
b. Many graphs are misleading; the public must look at them critically before trying to
interpret their results.
c. The scale on a graph doesn’t matter. Measurement data can be displayed using any scale
as long as that scale is consistent.
d. All of the above statements are true.
ANSWER: C

58. Which of the following would automatically mean a statistical picture is misleading?
a. A histogram where the scale is very large.
b. A pictogram where all money is converted to current U.S. dollar amounts.
c. A line graph where the axes do not start at zero.
d. None of the above.
ANSWER: D

REFERENCES FOR GRAPHS USED IN THIS CHAPTER

Questions 3, 12:
Ohio Lottery
http://www.ohiolottery.com/
Question 13, 21, 29, 30:
Bureau of Labor Statistics
http://www.wa.gov/esd/lmea/occdata/oeswage/Page2067.htm
Question 22:
"Cricket Thermometers," Field & Stream, July 1993, Vol. 98 Issue 3, p21.
Data excerpt from: The Songs of the Insects, (1949), by George W. Pierce, Harvard University
Press, pp.12-21.
Question 45:
U.S. Census Bureau
http://eire.census.gov/popest/data/states/tables/ST-EST2002-01.php
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 THE SICK CHAMBER

The New Monthly Magazine.]

[August, 1830.

What a difference between this subject and my last—a ‘Free

Admission!’ Yet from the crowded theatre to the sick chamber, from
the noise, the glare, the keen delight, to the loneliness, the darkness,
the dulness, and the pain, there is but one step. A breath of air, an
overhanging cloud effects it; and though the transition is made in an
instant, it seems as if it would last for ever. A sudden illness not only
puts a stop to the career of our triumphs and agreeable sensations,
but blots out and cancels all recollection of and desire for them. We
lose the relish of enjoyment; we are effectually cured of our romance.
Our bodies are confined to our beds; nor can our thoughts wantonly
detach themselves and take the road to pleasure, but turn back with
doubt and loathing at the faint, evanescent phantom which has
usurped its place. If the folding-doors of the imagination were
thrown open or left a-jar, so that from the disordered couch where
we lay, we could still hail the vista of the past or future, and see the
gay and gorgeous visions floating at a distance, however denied to
our embrace, the contrast, though mortifying, might have something
soothing in it, the mock-splendour might be the greater for the actual
gloom: but the misery is that we cannot conceive any thing beyond or
better than the present evil; we are shut up and spell-bound in that,
the curtains of the mind are drawn close, we cannot escape from ‘the
body of this death,’ our souls are conquered, dismayed, ‘cooped and
cabined in,’ and thrown with the lumber of our corporeal frames in
one corner of a neglected and solitary room. We hate ourselves and
everything else; nor does one ray of comfort ‘peep through the
blanket of the dark’ to give us hope. How should we entertain the
image of grace and beauty, when our bodies writhe with pain? To
what purpose invoke the echo of some rich strain of music, when we
ourselves can scarcely breathe? The very attempt is an impossibility.
We give up the vain task of linking delight to agony, of urging torpor
into ecstasy, which makes the very heart sick. We feel the present
pain, and an impatient longing to get rid of it. This were indeed ‘a
consummation devoutly to be wished’: on this we are intent, in
earnest, inexorable: all else is impertinence and folly; and could we
but obtain ease (that Goddess of the infirm and suffering) at any
price, we think we could forswear all other joy and all other sorrows.
Hoc erat in votis. All other things but our disorder and its cure seem
less than nothing and vanity. It assumes a palpable form; it becomes
a demon, a spectre, an incubus hovering over and oppressing us: we
grapple with it: it strikes its fangs into us, spreads its arms round us,
infects us with its breath, glares upon us with its hideous aspect; we
feel it take possession of every fibre and of every faculty; and we are
at length so absorbed and fascinated by it, that we cannot divert our
reflections from it for an instant, for all other things but pain (and
that which we suffer most acutely,) appear to have lost their pith and
power to interest. They are turned to dust and stubble. This is the
reason of the fine resolutions we sometimes form in such cases, and
of the vast superiority of a sick bed to the pomps and thrones of the
world. We easily renounce wine when we have nothing but the taste
of physic in our mouths: the rich banquet tempts us not, when ‘our
very gorge rises’ within us: Love and Beauty fly from a bed twisted
into a thousand folds by restless lassitude and tormenting cares: the
nerve of pleasure is killed by the pains that shoot through the head or
rack the limbs: an indigestion seizes you with its leaden grasp and
giant force (down, Ambition!)—you shiver and tremble like a leaf in a
fit of the ague (Avarice, let go your palsied hold!). We then are in the
mood, without ghostly advice, to betake ourselves to the life of
‘hermit poor,
‘In pensive place obscure,’—

and should be glad to prevent the return of a fever raging in the

blood by feeding on pulse, and slaking our thirst at the limpid brook.
These sudden resolutions, however, or ‘vows made in pain as violent
and void,’ are generally of short duration; the excess and the sorrow
for it are alike selfish; and those repentances which are the most loud
and passionate are the surest to end speedily in a relapse; for both
originate in the same cause, the being engrossed by the prevailing
feeling (whatever it may be), and an utter incapacity to look beyond
it.
‘The Devil was sick, the Devil a monk would be:
The Devil grew well, the Devil a monk was he!’

It is amazing how little effect physical suffering or local

circumstances have upon the mind, except while we are subject to
their immediate influence. While the impression lasts, they are every
thing: when it is gone, they are nothing. We toss and tumble about in
a sick bed; we lie on our right side, we then change to the left; we
stretch ourselves on our backs, we turn on our faces; we wrap
ourselves up under the clothes to exclude the cold, we throw them off
to escape the heat and suffocation; we grasp the pillow in agony, we
fling ourselves out of bed, we walk up and down the room with hasty
or feeble steps; we return into bed; we are worn out with fatigue and
pain, yet can get no repose for the one, or intermission for the other;
we summon all our patience, or give vent to passion and petty rage:
nothing avails; we seem wedded to our disease, ‘like life and death in
disproportion met;’ we make new efforts, try new expedients, but
nothing appears to shake it off, or promise relief from our grim foe: it
infixes its sharp sting into us, or overpowers us by its sickly and
stunning weight: every moment is as much as we can bear, and yet
there seems no end of our lengthening tortures; we are ready to faint
with exhaustion, or work ourselves up to frenzy: we ‘trouble deaf
Heaven with our bootless prayers:’ we think our last hour is come, or
peevishly wish it were, to put an end to the scene; we ask questions
as to the origin of evil and the necessity of pain; we ‘moralise our
complaints into a thousand similes’; we deny the use of medicine in
toto, we have a full persuasion that all doctors are mad or knaves,
that our object is to gain relief, and theirs (out of the perversity of
human nature, or to seem wiser than we) to prevent it; we catechise
the apothecary, rail at the nurse, and cannot so much as conceive the
possibility that this state of things should not last for ever; we are
even angry at those who would give us encouragement, as if they
would make dupes or children of us; we might seek a release by
poison, a halter, or the sword, but we have not strength of mind
enough—our nerves are too shaken—to attempt even this poor
revenge—when lo! a change comes, the spell falls off, and the next
moment we forget all that has happened to us. No sooner does our
disorder turn its back upon us than we laugh at it. The state we have
been in, sounds like a dream, a fable; health is the order of the day,
strength is ours de jure and de facto; and we discard all uncalled-for
evidence to the contrary with a smile of contemptuous incredulity,
just as we throw our physic-bottles out of the window! I see (as I
awake from a short, uneasy doze) a golden light shine through my
white window-curtains on the opposite wall:—is it the dawn of a new
day, or the departing light of evening? I do not well know, for the
opium ‘they have drugged my posset with’ has made strange havoc
with my brain, and I am uncertain whether time has stood still, or
advanced, or gone backward. By ‘puzzling o’er the doubt,’ my
attention is drawn a little out of myself to external objects; and I
consider whether it would not administer some relief to my
monotonous languour, if I could call up a vivid picture of an evening
sky I witnessed a short while before, the white fleecy clouds, the
azure vault, the verdant fields and balmy air. In vain! The wings of
fancy refuse to mount from my bed-side. The air without has nothing
in common with the closeness within: the clouds disappear, the sky
is instantly overcast and black. I walk out in this scene soon after I
recover; and with those favourite and well-known objects interposed,
can no longer recall the tumbled pillow, the juleps or the labels, or
the unwholesome dungeon in which I was before immured. What is
contrary to our present sensations or settled habits, amalgamates
indifferently with our belief: the imagination rules over imaginary
themes, the senses and custom have a narrower sway, and admit but
one guest at a time. It is hardly to be wondered at that we dread
physical calamities so little beforehand: we think no more of them
the moment after they have happened. Out of sight, out of mind.
This will perhaps explain why all actual punishment has so little
effect; it is a state contrary to nature, alien to the will. If it does not
touch honour and conscience (and where these are not, how can it
touch them?) it goes for nothing: and where these are, it rather sears
and hardens them. The gyves, the cell, the meagre fare, the hard
labour are abhorrent to the mind of the culprit on whom they are
imposed, who carries the love of liberty or indulgence to
licentiousness; and who throws the thought of them behind him (the
moment he can evade the penalty,) with scorn and laughter,
‘Like Samson his green wythes.’[25]

So, in travelling, we often meet with great fatigue and

inconvenience from heat or cold, or rather accidents, and resolve
never to go a journey again; but we are ready to set off on a new
excursion to-morrow. We remember the landscape, the change of
scene, the romantic expectation, and think no more of the heat, the
noise, and dust. The body forgets its grievances, till they recur; but
imagination, passion, pride, have a longer memory and quicker
apprehensions. To the first the pleasure or the pain is nothing when
once over; to the last it is only then that they begin to exist. The line
in Metastasio,
‘The worst of every evil is the fear,’

is true only when applied to this latter sort.—It is curious that, on

coming out of a sick room, where one has been pent some time, and
grown weak and nervous, and looking at Nature for the first time, the
objects that present themselves have a very questionable and spectral
appearance, the people in the street resemble flies crawling about,
and seem scarce half-alive. It is we who are just risen from a torpid
and unwholesome state, and who impart our imperfect feelings of
existence, health, and motion to others. Or it may be that the
violence and exertion of the pain we have gone through make
common every-day objects seem unreal and unsubstantial. It is not
till we have established ourselves in form in the sitting-room,
wheeled round the arm-chair to the fire (for this makes part of our
re-introduction to the ordinary modes of being in all seasons,) felt
our appetite return, and taken up a book, that we can be considered
as at all restored to ourselves. And even then our first sensations are
rather empirical than positive; as after sleep we stretch out our
hands to know whether we are awake. This is the time for reading.
Books are then indeed ‘a world, both pure and good,’ into which we
enter with all our hearts, after our revival from illness and respite
from the tomb, as with the freshness and novelty of youth. They are
not merely acceptable as without too much exertion they pass the
time and relieve ennui; but from a certain suspension and deadening
of the passions, and abstraction from worldly pursuits, they may be
said to bring back and be friendly to the guileless and enthusiastic
tone of feeling with which we formerly read them. Sickness has
weaned us pro tempore from contest and cabal; and we are fain to be
docile and children again. All strong changes in our present pursuits
throw us back upon the past. This is the shortest and most complete
emancipation from our late discomfiture. We wonder that any one
who has read The History of a Foundling should labour under an
indigestion; nor do we comprehend how a perusal of the Faery
Queen should not ensure the true believer an uninterrupted
succession of halcyon days. Present objects bear a retrospective
meaning, and point to ‘a foregone conclusion.’ Returning back to life
with half-strung nerves and shattered strength, we seem as when we
first entered it with uncertain purposes and faltering aims. The
machine has received a shock, and it moves on more tremulously
than before, and not all at once in the beaten track. Startled at the
approach of death, we are willing to get as far from it as we can by
making a proxy of our former selves; and finding the precarious
tenure by which we hold existence, and its last sands running out, we
gather up and make the most of the fragments that memory has
stored up for us. Every thing is seen through a medium of reflection
and contrast. We hear the sound of merry voices in the street; and
this carries us back to the recollections of some country-town or
village-group—
‘We see the children sporting on the shore,
And hear the mighty waters roaring evermore.’

A cricket chirps on the hearth, and we are reminded of Christmas

gambols long ago. The very cries in the street seem to be of a former
date; and the dry toast eats very much as it did—twenty years ago. A
rose smells doubly sweet, after being stifled with tinctures and
essences; and we enjoy the idea of a journey and an inn the more for
having been bed-rid. But a book is the secret and sure charm to bring
all these implied associations to a focus. I should prefer an old one,
Mr. Lamb’s favourite, the Journey to Lisbon; or the Decameron, if I
could get it; but if a new one, let it be Paul Clifford. That book has
the singular advantage of being written by a gentleman, and not
about his own class. The characters he commemorates are every
moment at fault between life and death, hunger and a forced loan on
the public; and therefore the interest they take in themselves, and
which we take in them, has no cant or affectation in it, but is ‘lively,
audible, and full of vent.’ A set of well-dressed gentlemen picking
their teeth with a graceful air after dinner, endeavouring to keep
their cravats from the slightest discomposure, and saying the most
insipid things in the most insipid manner, do not make a scene. Well,
then, I have got the new paraphrase on the Beggar’s Opera, am fairly
embarked on it; and at the end of the first volume, where I am
galloping across the heath with the three highwaymen, while the
moon is shining full upon them, feel my nerves so braced, and my
spirits so exhilarated, that, to say truth, I am scarce sorry for the
occasion that has thrown me upon the work and the author—have
quite forgot my Sick Room, and am more than half ready to recant
the doctrine that a Free Admission to the theatre is
—‘The true pathos and sublime
Of human life’:—

for I feel as I read that if the stage shows us the masks of men and
the pageant of the world, books let us into their souls and lay open to
us the secrets of our own. They are the first and last, the most home-
felt, the most heartfelt of all our enjoyments.
 FOOTMEN

The New Monthly Magazine.]

[September, 1830.

Footmen are no part of Christianity; but they are a very necessary

appendage to our happy Constitution in Church and State. What
would the bishop’s mitre be without these grave supporters to his
dignity? Even the plain presbyter does not dispense with his decent
serving-man to stand behind his chair and load his duly emptied
plate with beef and pudding, at which the genius of Ude turns pale.
What would become of the coronet-coach filled with elegant and
languid forms, if it were not for the triple row of powdered, laced,
and liveried footmen, clustering, fluttering, and lounging behind it?
What an idea do we not conceive of the fashionable belle who is
making the most of her time and tumbling over silks and satins
within at Sewell and Cross’s, or at the Bazaar in Soho-square, from
the tall lacquey in blue and silver with gold-headed cane, cocked-hat,
white thread stockings and large calves to his legs, who stands as her
representative without! The sleek shopman appears at the door, at an
understood signal the livery-servant starts from his position, the
coach-door flies open, the steps are let down, the young lady enters
the carriage as young ladies are taught to step into carriages, the
footman closes the door, mounts behind, and the glossy vehicle rolls
off, bearing its lovely burden and her gaudy attendant from the gaze
of the gaping crowd! Is there not a spell in beauty, a charm in rank
and fashion, that one would almost wish to be this fellow—to obey its
nod, to watch its looks, to breathe but by its permission, and to live
but for its use, its scorn, or pride?
Footmen are in general looked upon as a sort of supernumeraries
in society—they have no place assigned them in any Scotch
Encyclopædia—they do not come under any of the heads in Mr. Mill’s
Elements, or Mr. Maculloch’s Principles of Political Economy; and
they nowhere have had impartial justice done them, except in Lady
Booby’s love for one of that order. But if not ‘the Corinthian capitals
of polished society,’ they are ‘a graceful ornament to the civil order.’
Lords and ladies could not do without them. Nothing exists in this
world but by contrast. A foil is necessary to make the plainest truths
self-evident. It is the very insignificance, the nonentity as it were of
the gentlemen of the cloth, that constitutes their importance, and
makes them an indispensable feature in the social system, by setting
off the pretensions of their superiors to the best advantage. What
would be the good of having a will of our own, if we had not others
about us who are deprived of all will of their own, and who wear a
badge to say ‘I serve?’ How can we show that we are the lords of the
creation but by reducing others to the condition of machines, who
never move but at the beck of our caprices? Is not the plain suit of
the master wonderfully relieved by the borrowed trappings and
mock-finery of his servant? You see that man on horseback who
keeps at some distance behind another, who follows him as his
shadow, turns as he turns, and as he passes or speaks to him, lifts his
hand to his hat and observes the most profound attention—what is
the difference between these two men? The one is as well mounted,
as well fed, is younger and seemingly in better health than the other;
but between these two there are perhaps seven or eight classes of
society, each of whom is dependent on and trembles at the frown of
the other—it is a nobleman and his lacquey. Let any one take a stroll
towards the West-end of the town, South Audley or Upper
Grosvenor-street; it is then he will feel himself first entering into the
beau-ideal of civilized life, a society composed entirely of lords and
footmen! Deliver me from the filth and cellars of St. Giles’s, from the
shops of Holborn and the Strand, from all that appertains to middle
and to low life; and commend me to the streets with the straw at the
doors and hatchments overhead to tell us of those who are just born
or who are just dead, and with groups of footmen lounging on the
steps and insulting the passengers—it is then I feel the true dignity
and imaginary pretensions of human nature realised! There is here
none of the squalidness of poverty, none of the hardships of daily
labour, none of the anxiety and petty artifice of trade; life’s business
is changed into a romance, a summer’s dream, and nothing painful,
disgusting, or vulgar intrudes. All is on a liberal and handsome scale.
The true ends and benefits of society are here enjoyed and
bountifully lavished, and all the trouble and misery banished, and
not even allowed so much as to exist in thought. Those who would
find the real Utopia, should look for it somewhere about Park-lane or
May Fair. It is there only any feasible approach to equality is made—
for it is like master like man. Here, as I look down Curzon Street, or
catch a glimpse of the taper spire of South Audley Chapel, or the
family-arms on the gate of Chesterfield-House, the vista of years
opens to me, and I recall the period of the triumph of Mr. Burke’s
‘Reflections on the French Revolution,’ and the overthrow of ‘The
Rights of Man!’ You do not indeed penetrate to the interior of the
mansion where sits the stately possessor, luxurious and refined; but
you draw your inference from the lazy, pampered, motley crew
poured forth from his portals. This mealy-coated, moth-like,
butterfly-generation, seem to have no earthly business but to enjoy
themselves. Their green liveries accord with the budding leaves and
spreading branches of the trees in Hyde Park—they seem ‘like
brothers of the groves’—their red faces and powdered heads
harmonise with the blossoms of the neighbouring almond-trees, that
shoot their sprays over old-fashioned brick-walls. They come forth
like grasshoppers in June, as numerous and as noisy. They bask in
the sun and laugh in your face. Not only does the master enjoy an
uninterrupted leisure and tranquillity—those in his employment
have nothing to do. He wants drones, not drudges, about him, to
share his superfluity, and give a haughty pledge of his exemption
from care. They grow sleek and wanton, saucy and supple. From
being independent of the world, they acquire the look of gentlemen’s
gentlemen. There is a cast of the aristocracy, with a slight shade of
distinction. The saying, ‘Tell me your company, and I’ll tell you your
manners,’ may be applied cum grano salis to the servants in great
families. Mr. N—— knew an old butler who had lived with a
nobleman so long, and had learned to imitate his walk, look, and way
of speaking, so exactly that it was next to impossible to tell them
apart. See the porter in the great leather-chair in the hall—how big,
and burly, and self-important he looks; while my Lord’s gentleman
(the politician of the family) is reading the second edition of ‘The
Courier’ (once more in request) at the side window, and the footman
is romping, or taking tea with the maids in the kitchen below. A
match-girl meanwhile plies her shrill trade at the railing; or a gipsey-
woman passes with her rustic wares through the street, avoiding the
closer haunts of the city. What a pleasant farce is that of ‘High Life
Below Stairs!’ What a careless life do the domestics of the Great lead!
For, not to speak of the reflected self-importance of their masters
and mistresses, and the contempt with which they look down on the
herd of mankind, they have only to eat and drink their fill, talk the
scandal of the neighbourhood, laugh at the follies, or assist the
intrigues of their betters, till they themselves fall in love, marry, set
up a public house, (the only thing they are fit for,) and without habits
of industry, resources in themselves, or self-respect, and drawing
fruitless comparisons with the past, are, of all people, the most
miserable! Service is no inheritance; and when it fails, there is not a
more helpless, or more worthless set of devils in the world. Mr. C——
used to say he should like to be a footman to some elderly lady of
quality, to carry her prayer-book to church, and place her cassock
right for her. There can be no doubt that this would have been better,
and quite as useful as the life he has led, dancing attendance on
Prejudice, but flirting with Paradox in such a way as to cut himself
out of the old lady’s will. For my part, if I had to choose, I should
prefer the service of a young mistress, and might share the fate of the
footman recorded in heroic verse by Lady Wortley Montagu.
Certainly it can be no hard duty, though a sort of forlorn hope, to
have to follow three sisters, or youthful friends, (resembling the
three Graces,) at a slow pace, and with grave demeanour, from
Cumberland Gate to Kensington Gardens—to be there shut out, a
privation enhancing the privilege, and making the sense of distant,
respectful, idolatrous admiration more intense—and then, after a
brief interval lost in idle chat, or idler reverie, to have to follow them
back again, observing, not observed, to keep within call, to watch
every gesture, to see the breeze play with the light tresses or lift the
morning robe aside, to catch the half-suppressed laugh, and hear the
low murmur of indistinct words and wishes, like the music of the
spheres. An amateur footman would seem a more rational
occupation than that of an amateur author, or an amateur artist. An
insurmountable barrier, if it excludes passion, does not banish
sentiment, but draws an atmosphere of superstitious, trembling
apprehension round the object of so much attention and respect;
nothing makes women seem so much like angels as always to see,
never to converse with them; and those whom we have to dangle a
cane after must, to a lacquey of any spirit, appear worthy to wield
sceptres.
But of all situations of this kind, the most enviable is that of a
lady’s maid in a family travelling abroad. In the obtuseness of
foreigners to the nice gradations of English refinement and manners,
the maid has not seldom a chance of being taken for the mistress—a
circumstance never to be forgot! See our Abigail mounted in the
dicky with my Lord, or John, snug and comfortable—setting out on
the grand tour as fast as four horses can carry her, whirled over the
‘vine-covered hills and gay regions of France,’ crossing the Alps and
Apennines in breathless terror and wonder—frightened at a
precipice, laughing at her escape—coming to the inn, going into the
kitchen to see what is to be had—not speaking a word of the
language, except what she picks up, ‘as pigeons pick up peas:‘—the
bill paid, the passport visé, the horses put to, and au route again—
seeing every thing, and understanding nothing, in a full tide of
health, fresh air, and animal spirits, and without one qualm of taste
or sentiment, and arriving at Florence, the city of palaces, with its
amphitheatre of hills and olives, without suspecting that such a
person as Boccacio, Dante, or Galileo, had ever lived there, while her
young mistress is puzzled with the varieties of the Tuscan dialect, is
disappointed in the Arno, and cannot tell what to make of the statue
of David by Michael Angelo, in the Great Square. The difference is,
that the young lady, on her return, has something to think of; but the
maid absolutely forgets every thing, and is only giddy and out of
breath, as if she had been up in a balloon.
‘No more: where ignorance is bliss,
’Tis folly to be wise!’

English servants abroad, notwithstanding the comforts they enjoy,

and although travelling as it were en famille, must be struck with the
ease and familiar footing on which foreigners live with their
domestics, compared with the distance and reserve with which they
are treated. The housemaid (la bonne) sits down in the room, or
walks abreast with you in the street; and the valet who waits behind
his master’s chair at table, gives Monsieur his advice or opinion
without being asked for it. We need not wonder at this familiarity
and freedom, when we consider that those who allowed it could
(formerly at least, when the custom began) send those who
transgressed but in the smallest degree to the Bastille or the galleys
at their pleasure. The licence was attended with perfect impunity.
With us the law leaves less to discretion; and by interposing a real
independence (and plea of right) between the servant and master,
does away with the appearance of it on the surface of manners. The
insolence and tyranny of the Aristocracy fell more on the
tradespeople and mechanics than on their domestics, who were
attached to them by a semblance of feudal ties. Thus an upstart lady
of quality (an imitator of the old school) would not deign to speak to
a milliner while fitting on her dress, but gave her orders to her
waiting-women to tell her what to do. Can we wonder at twenty
reigns of terror to efface such a feeling?
I have alluded to the inclination in servants in great houses to ape
the manners of their superiors, and to their sometimes succeeding.
What facilitates the metamorphosis is, that the Great, in their
character of courtiers, are a sort of footmen in their turn. There is
the same crouching to interest and authority in either case, with the
same surrender or absence of personal dignity—the same submission
to the trammels of outward form, with the same suppression of
inward impulses—the same degrading finery, the same pretended
deference in the eye of the world, and the same lurking contempt
from being admitted behind the scenes, the same heartlessness, and
the same eye-service—in a word, they are alike puppets governed by
motives not their own, machines made of coarser or finer materials.
It is not, therefore, surprising, if the most finished courtier of the day
cannot, by a vulgar eye, be distinguished from a gentleman’s servant.
M. de Bausset, in his amusing and excellent Memoirs, makes it an
argument of the legitimacy of Napoleon’s authority, that from
denying it, it would follow that his lords of the bed-chamber were
valets, and he himself (as prefect of the palace) no better than head-
cook. The inference is logical enough. According to the author’s view,
there was no other difference between the retainers of the court and
the kitchen than the rank of the master!
I remember hearing it said that ‘all men were equal but footmen.’
But of all footmen the lowest class is literary footmen. These consist
of persons who, without a single grain of knowledge, taste, or feeling,
put on the livery of learning, mimic its phrases by rote, and are
retained in its service by dint of quackery and assurance alone. As
they have none of the essence, they have all the externals of men of
gravity and wisdom. They wear green spectacles, walk with a peculiar
strut, thrust themselves into the acquaintance of persons they hear
talked of, get introduced into the clubs, are seen reading books they
do not understand at the Museum and public libraries, dine (if they
can) with lords or officers of the Guards, abuse any party as low to
show what fine gentlemen they are, and the next week join the same
party to raise their own credit and gain a little consequence, give
themselves out as wits, critics, and philosophers (and as they have
never done any thing, no man can contradict them), and have a great
knack of turning editors, and not paying their contributors. If you get
five pounds from one of them, he never forgives it. With the proceeds
thus appropriated, the book-worm graduates a dandy, hires
expensive apartments, sports a tandem, and it is inferred that he
must be a great author who can support such an appearance with his
pen, and a great genius who can conduct so many learned works
while his time is devoted to the gay, the fair, and the rich. This
introduces him to new editorships, to new and more select
friendships, and to more frequent and importunate demands from
debts and duns. At length the bubble bursts and disappears, and you
hear no more of our classical adventurer, except from the invectives
and self-reproaches of those who took him for a great scholar from
his wearing green spectacles and Wellington-boots. Such a candidate
for literary honours bears the same relation to the man of letters,
that the valet with his second-hand finery and servile airs does to his
master.
 ON THE WANT OF MONEY

The Monthly Magazine.]

[January, 1827.

It is hard to be without money. To get on without it is like

travelling in a foreign country without a passport—you are stopped,
suspected, and made ridiculous at every turn, besides being
subjected to the most serious inconveniences. The want of money I
here allude to is not altogether that which arises from absolute
poverty—where there is a downright absence of the common
necessaries of life, this must be remedied by incessant hard labour,
and the least we can receive in return is a supply of our daily wants—
but that uncertain, casual, precarious mode of existence, in which the
temptation to spend remains after the means are exhausted, the
want of money joined with the hope and possibility of getting it, the
intermediate state of difficulty and suspense between the last guinea
or shilling and the next that we may have the good luck to encounter.
This gap, this unwelcome interval constantly recurring, however
shabbily got over, is really full of many anxieties, misgivings,
mortifications, meannesses, and deplorable embarrassments of every
description. I may attempt (this essay is not a fanciful speculation) to
enlarge upon a few of them.
It is hard to go without one’s dinner through sheer distress, but
harder still to go without one’s breakfast. Upon the strength of that
first and aboriginal meal, one may muster courage to face the
difficulties before one, and to dare the worst: but to be roused out of
one’s warm bed, and perhaps a profound oblivion of care, with
golden dreams (for poverty does not prevent golden dreams), and
told there is nothing for breakfast, is cold comfort for which one’s
half-strung nerves are not prepared, and throws a damp upon the
prospects of the day. It is a bad beginning. A man without a breakfast
is a poor creature, unfit to go in search of one, to meet the frown of
the world, or to borrow a shilling of a friend. He may beg at the
corner of a street—nothing is too mean for the tone of his feelings—
robbing on the highway is out of the question, as requiring too much
courage, and some opinion of a man’s self. It is, indeed, as old Fuller,
or some worthy of that age, expresses it, ‘the heaviest stone which
melancholy can throw at a man,’ to learn, the first thing after he rises
in the morning, or even to be dunned with it in bed, that there is no
loaf, tea, or butter in the house, and that the baker, the grocer, and
butterman have refused to give any farther credit. This is taking one
sadly at a disadvantage. It is striking at one’s spirit and resolution in
their very source,—the stomach—it is attacking one on the side of
hunger and mortification at once; it is casting one into the very mire
of humility and Slough of Despond. The worst is, to know what face
to put upon the matter, what excuse to make to the servants, what
answer to send to the tradespeople; whether to laugh it off, or be
grave, or angry, or indifferent; in short, to know how to parry off an
evil which you cannot help. What a luxury, what a God’s-send in such
a dilemma, to find a half-crown which had slipped through a hole in
the lining of your waistcoat, a crumpled bank-note in your breeches-
pocket, or a guinea clinking in the bottom of your trunk, which had
been thoughtlessly left there out of a former heap! Vain hope!
Unfounded illusion! The experienced in such matters know better,
and laugh in their sleeves at so improbable a suggestion. Not a
corner, not a cranny, not a pocket, not a drawer has been left
unrummaged, or has not been subjected over and over again to more
than the strictness of a custom-house scrutiny. Not the slightest
rustle of a piece of bank-paper, not the gentlest pressure of a piece of
hard metal, but would have given notice of its hiding-place with
electrical rapidity, long before, in such circumstances. All the variety
of pecuniary resources which form a legal tender on the current coin
of the realm, are assuredly drained, exhausted to the last farthing
before this time. But is there nothing in the house that one can turn
to account! Is there not an old family-watch, or piece of plate, or a
ring, or some worthless trinket that one could part with? nothing
belonging to one’s-self or a friend, that one could raise the wind
upon, till something better turns up? At this moment an old clothes-
man passes, and his deep, harsh tones sound like an intended insult
on one’s distress, and banish the thought of applying for his
assistance, as one’s eye glanced furtively at an old hat or a great coat,
hung up behind a closet-door. Humiliating contemplations!
Miserable uncertainty! One hesitates, and the opportunity is gone by;
for without one’s breakfast, one has not the resolution to do any
thing!—The late Mr. Sheridan was often reduced to this unpleasant
predicament. Possibly he had little appetite for breakfast himself; but
the servants complained bitterly on this head, and said that Mrs.
Sheridan was sometimes kept waiting for a couple of hours, while
they had to hunt through the neighbourhood, and beat up for coffee,
eggs, and French rolls. The same perplexity in this instance appears
to have extended to the providing for the dinner; for so sharp-set
were they, that to cut short a debate with a butcher’s apprentice
about leaving a leg of mutton without the money, the cook clapped it
into the pot: the butcher’s boy, probably used to such encounters,
with equal coolness took it out again, and marched off with it in his
tray in triumph. It required a man to be the author of The School
for Scandal, to run the gauntlet of such disagreeable occurrences
every hour of the day. There was one comfort, however, that poor
Sheridan had: he did not foresee that Mr. Moore would write his
Life![26]
The going without a dinner is another of the miseries of wanting
money, though one can bear up against this calamity better than the
former, which really ‘blights the tender blossom and promise of the
day.’ With one good meal, one may hold a parley with hunger and
moralize upon temperance. One has time to turn one’s-self and look
about one—to ‘screw one’s courage to the sticking-place,’ to graduate
the scale of disappointment, and stave off appetite till supper-time.
You gain time, and time in this weather-cock world is everything.
You may dine at two, or at six, or seven—as most convenient. You
may in the meanwhile receive an invitation to dinner, or some one
(not knowing how you are circumstanced) may send you a present of
a haunch of venison or a brace of pheasants from the country, or a
distant relation may die and leave you a legacy, or a patron may call
and overwhelm you with his smiles and bounty,
‘As kind as kings upon their coronation-day;’
or there is no saying what may happen. One may wait for dinner—
breakfast admits of no delay, of no interval interposed between that
and our first waking thoughts.[27] Besides, there are shifts and
devices, shabby and mortifying enough, but still available in case of
need. How many expedients are there in this great city (London),
time out of mind and times without number, resorted to by the
dilapidated and thrifty speculator, to get through this grand difficulty
without utter failure! One may dive into a cellar, and dine on boiled
beef and carrots for tenpence, with the knives and forks chained to
the table, and jostled by greasy elbows that seem to make such a
precaution not unnecessary (hunger is proof against indignity!)—or
one may contrive to part with a superfluous article of wearing
apparel, and carry home a mutton-chop and cook it in a garret; or
one may drop in at a friend’s at the dinner-hour, and be asked to stay
or not; or one may walk out and take a turn in the Park, about the
time, and return home to tea, so as at least to avoid the sting of the
evil—the appearance of not having dined. You then have the laugh on
your side, having deceived the gossips, and can submit to the want of
a sumptuous repast without murmuring, having saved your pride,
and made a virtue of necessity. I say all this may be done by a man
without a family (for what business has a man without money with
one?—See English Malthus and Scotch Macculloch)—and it is only
my intention here to bring forward such instances of the want of
money as are tolerable both in theory and practice. I once lived on
coffee (as an experiment) for a fortnight together, while I was
finishing the copy of a half-length portrait of a Manchester
manufacturer, who had died worth a plum. I rather slurred over the
coat, which was a reddish brown, ‘of formal cut,’ to receive my five
guineas, with which I went to market myself, and dined on sausages
and mashed potatoes, and while they were getting ready, and I could
hear them hissing in the pan, read a volume of Gil Blas, containing
the account of the fair Aurora. This was in the days of my youth.
Gentle reader, do not smile! Neither Monsieur de Very, nor Louis
XVIII., over an oyster-pâté, nor Apicius himself, ever understood the
meaning of the word luxury, better than I did at that moment! If the
want of money has its drawbacks and disadvantages, it is not without
its contrasts and counterbalancing effects, for which I fear nothing
else can make us amends. Amelia’s hashed mutton is immortal; and
there is something amusing, though carried to excess and caricature
(which is very unusual with the author) in the contrivances of old
Caleb, in ‘The Bride of Lammermuir,’ for raising the wind at
breakfast, dinner, and supper-time. I recollect a ludicrous instance of
a disappointment in a dinner which happened to a person of my
acquaintance some years ago. He was not only poor but a very poor
creature, as will be imagined. His wife had laid by fourpence (their
whole remaining stock) to pay for the baking of a shoulder of mutton
and potatoes, which they had in the house, and on her return home
from some errand, she found he had expended it in purchasing a new
string for a guitar. On this occasion a witty friend quoted the lines
from Milton:
‘And ever against eating cares,
Wrap me in soft Lydian airs!’

Defoe, in his Life of Colonel Jack, gives a striking picture of his

young beggarly hero sitting with his companion for the first time in
his life at a three-penny ordinary, and the delight with which he
relished the hot smoking soup, and the airs with which he called
about him—‘and every time,’ he says, ‘we called for bread, or beer, or
whatever it might be, the waiter answered, “coming, gentlemen,
coming;” and this delighted me more than all the rest!’ It was about
this time, as the same pithy author expresses it, ‘the Colonel took
upon him to wear a shirt!’ Nothing can be finer than the whole of the
feeling conveyed in the commencement of this novel, about wealth
and finery from the immediate contrast of privation and poverty.
One would think it a labour, like the Tower of Babel, to build up a
beau and a fine gentleman about town. The little vagabond’s
admiration of the old man at the banking-house, who sits
surrounded by heaps of gold as if it were a dream or poetic vision,
and his own eager anxious visits, day by day, to the hoard he had
deposited in the hollow tree, are in the very foremost style of truth
and nature. See the same intense feeling expressed in Luke’s address
to his riches in the City Madam, and in the extraordinary raptures of
the ‘Spanish Rogue’ in contemplating and hugging his ingots of pure
gold and Spanish pieces of eight: to which Mr. Lamb has referred in
excuse for the rhapsodies of some of our elder poets on this subject,
which to our present more refined and tamer apprehensions sound
like blasphemy.[28] In earlier times, before the diffusion of luxury, of
knowledge, and other sources of enjoyment had become common,
and acted as a diversion to the cravings of avarice, the passionate
admiration, the idolatry, the hunger and thirst of wealth and all its
precious symbols, was a kind of madness or hallucination, and
Mammon was truly worshipped as a god!
It is among the miseries of the want of money, not to be able to pay
your reckoning at an inn—or, if you have just enough to do that, to
have nothing left for the waiter;—to be stopped at a turnpike gate,
and forced to turn back;—not to venture to call a hackney-coach in a
shower of rain—(when you have only one shilling left yourself, it is a
bore to have it taken out of your pocket by a friend, who comes into
your house eating peaches in a hot summer’s day, and desiring you to
pay for the coach in which he visits you);—not to be able to purchase
a lottery-ticket, by which you might make your fortune, and get out
of all your difficulties;—or to find a letter lying for you at a country
post-office, and not to have money in your pocket to free it, and be
obliged to return for it the next day. The letter so unseasonably
withheld may be supposed to contain money, and in this case there is
a foretaste, a sort of actual possession taken through the thin folds of
the paper and the wax, which in some measure indemnifies us for the
delay: the bank-note, the post-bill seems to smile upon us, and shake
hands through its prison bars;—or it may be a love-letter, and then
the tantalization is at its height: to be deprived in this manner of the
only consolation that can make us amends for the want of money, by
this very want—to fancy you can see the name—to try to get a peep at
the hand-writing—to touch the seal, and yet not dare to break it open
—is provoking indeed—the climax of amorous and gentlemanly
distress. Players are sometimes reduced to great extremity, by the
seizure of their scenes and dresses, or (what is called) the property of
the theatre, which hinders them from acting; as authors are
prevented from finishing a work, for want of money to buy the books
necessary to be consulted on some material point or circumstance, in
the progress of it. There is a set of poor devils, who live upon a
printed prospectus of a work that never will be written, for which
they solicit your name and half-a-crown. Decayed actresses take an
annual benefit at one of the theatres; there are patriots who live upon
periodical subscriptions, and critics who go about the country
lecturing on poetry. I confess I envy none of these; but there are
persons who, provided they can live, care not how they live—who are
fond of display, even when it implies exposure; who court notoriety